The present invention relates to a chemiluminescent lighting apparatus that can be used as a marker head of a missile carried by an aircraft or as an emergency illuminating source.
Numerous devices are presently in use by aircraft to mark desired areas on land or at sea locations so that the area can be easily identified and located again. This procedure is followed on search and rescue missions or to mark targets to be destroyed during military operations. Frequently it is required that the marker be visible at night from high altitudes for substantial periods of time. This is especially true when high performance aircraft are used for ordnance delivery against enemy positions or where it is necessary to establish a reference point for other military operations at night.
One of the major drawbacks of aircraft attacking ground or sea targets with bombs or missiles is the accuracy necessary to hit the chosen target area during reduced visibility conditions or during nighttime operations. Conventional weapons for air to surface attack are usually gravity type bombs and missiles. Because of high speeds of the fighter aircraft and the brief time available over the target the launch constraints required for a visual attack with conventional weapons are severe. In many cases to attain accurate delivery of such weapons at night requires the attacking aircraft to sight the target area from five to seven miles from the target area. Since the attacking aircraft may be flying at altitudes and ranges that make it extremely vulnerable to surface air weapons it is desirable that the aircraft be capable of stand-off ordnance delivery.
Considerable effort has been expended by both the Government and private industry in attempting to construct chemiluminescent lighting devices for either night marking or emergency applications. One of these devices releases a chemiluminescent cloud by means of an aerosol spray.
Another such device used to mark a surface area is a canister filled with chemiluminescent material. This canister when launched from an aircraft or a surface craft bursts on contact with the ground and drives a piston by means of generated gas to eject the chemiluminescent material 20 to 40 feet in the air. As it settles to the ground a large area is covered by the dispersed particles.
Still another type of location marker that is launched from an aircraft are strips of cloth material that first have been saturated with chemiluminsecent material. A container filled with an activator material is ruptured to allow a liquid activator to saturate the cloth material. A predetermined time later the cloth or cloths are ejected from the container and fall to the ground to provide a visible marked area.